Apple has Struck a Major iPad Deal with Major League Baseball

Apple has struck a multi-year deal with Major League Baseball that will see all teams use iPad Pro tablets inside their dugouts according to a report from Wall Street Journal

Giving coaches iPads loaded with player data is a natural next step for the game, and something teams have called for, Mr. Manfred said. The deal coincides with the lifting of a longstanding ban on using laptops, tablets and smartphones in dugouts, he said.

“We’re not just replacing binders with tablets, we’re actually helping them do things that weren’t possible before,” said Phil Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of marketing. For instance, players who wanted to see a video of pitchers and hitters from earlier games had to run back to the locker room.

The league will issue team managers and coaches Apple’s 12.9-inch iPad Pros fitted with rugged cases displaying the league’s logo. The software centerpiece is a custom app called MLB Dugout, built by MLB’s New York-based Advanced Media division, with assistance from Apple.

The Apple-MLB deal follows a $400-million, four-year agreement between the National Football League and Microsoft Corp. in 2013 that replaced traditional playbooks with Microsoft Surface tablets.